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Thursday, September 7, 2017

Master Soap Soap Gifts

Update Thursday, September 7, 2017.

Four years after writing the below Master Soap Soap Gifts post, I'm finally, finally, finally through with the last bar of handmade soap bought from Etsy.

Sorry to say, but I won't ever buy anymore of those soaps. Sure, they look and smell nice and I'm supporting small businesses, but aside from a few, the rest either disintegrated into a puddle of slimy goo that clogged my sink drain or cracked up and crumbled into tiny pieces, forcing me to toss most at about 2/3 the way through. Urgh.

So I was more than happy to move on to these cutesy soaps from the Otomebakko (Maiden Coffret) I'd kept for myself and was promptly forced to eat my words. "Decoration soaps," I said, "used to beautify the bathroom counter or hallway accent tables, and use the larger cutesy soaps but temper your expectations". I was such an asshole, dismissing these soaps without trying them first!

Because you know what, we finally tried the usagi (rabbit) soap in the clear cellophane wrapper and, well, it turns out to be a fantastic bar of soap! It foams well and washes well without being too drying. Best of all, we're more than half way through the bar and it has neither melted nor cracked. To quote hubby, "This is the best soap we've used since coming
home from Tokyo!"

The whole time in Tokyo, we were using mostly L'Occitane Bonne Mere soaps for our hands and liquid body wash for the shower. And with Tokyo being hot and humid, the Bonne Mere bars were great but here at home they're super drying. Considering we wash our hands all the freakin' time with a baby, it's actually quite impressive that the usagi soap hasn't deep fried our hands yet. Why the hell did we put up with all those crappy soaps while shelving these great ones for four years? Argh!!!

Guess who's doing some major damage via Master Soap's online store? They do ship internationally, by the way, and using EMS only, which means I paid an arm and a leg for soaps. But then I'd spent triple quadruple that before for the Etsy soaps, only to toss so many away. So I won't complain paying for good soaps. You can expect to see more of Master Soap.

Spotted these Master Soap Soap Gifts in Alpha Beauty UK's E(vil)bay store (*not* affiliated!) and snatched these up in a jiffy ^.^ If you live in Japan, you should check out Master Soap's website, as the Japanese retails for these adorable soap gifts are quite reasonable, between 300-2,700JPY depends on the size of the gift.

Also, it should be noted that the cutesy ones are most likely "decoration soaps" or scenting soaps, you know, to beautify the bathroom counter or hallway accent tables, etc. They do sell bath/hand soaps and you can certainly use the larger cutesy soaps, just temper your expectation accordingly ^.^ I haven't tried them myself so I can't really say one way or another, but I can tell you they are super duper cute in person and make excellent gifts and/or decorations for your family, friends, and home!

Otomebakko (Maiden Coffret) Soap Gift

First up is the Otomebakko (Maiden Coffret) Soap Gift, a dual-drawer rectangular gift box filled with 5 soap bars and a wash cloth, or at least I think it's a wash cloth ^.^ It's too thick and rough to be a handkerchief, at the same it doesn't have that plushness or the loopy threads that you would normally find on washcloths. But then it's included in a soap box, so if not a wash cloth then what would it be?!? But hey, it has a really cute pink sakura and white rabbit print on a pastel pink background xD

The soaps are all decently sized with the exception of the smaller strawberry soap. They are scented with lovely but mild fragrances although you can still sort of smell the soapiness underneath the fragrances. There are 2 sakura soaps, one flower shaped in clear cellophane wrapper and one larger rounded bar in paper wrapper in a pretty box. Double packaging is sooooo Japanese, but perhaps it's meant to be given away individually as a gift? There are also 2 strawberry soaps, a smaller strawberry shaped in clear cellophane wrapper and again a larger rounded one in paper wrapper in a pretty box. The fifth is an usagi (rabbit) soap, which is pretty much a rounded white bar in clear cellophane that's been printed with rabbit ears ^.^ How adorable is that?!? They's almost too cute for me to use!!!

Here is a smaller Hana Usagi (Flower and Rabbit) Soap Gift Box (large). which I gifted to my sister ^.^ This is also a dual-drawer in a square gift box.

This gift box comes with 2 usagi rounded soaps in clear cellophane wrapper, 2 sakura sounded soaps with "floating" flowers in clear cellophane, a washcloth, and a small packet of mini soaps cut in the shapes of rabbit, sakuras, and sakura petals! This washcloth has an adorable white rabbit and sakura petals print on a beige background.

Last one is the Hana Usagi Soap Gift Set (small), which I gifted to my cousin J. who visited me back in March. This one comes with just one usagi soap, a washcloth in the same print as the large Hana Usagi box above, as well as a packet of the same mini soaps. This smaller gift box retails at just 500JPY too!!!

2 comments:

You know, I totally stocked up on these and they'll probably last me a while. But I still love them and it wasn't just a one-off, so yeah, I think paying that international EMS shipping was totally worth it!